There's been a fair bit of discussion about Skype in the technology world lately; whispers here and there have had some believe that it will soon be sold by its owner, eBay. The lads over at the New York Times have reason to believe that, on Tuesday, said deal will become a reality. The tip came from two people said to be briefed on the deal by the company itself.

You might recall that eBay announced that it was looking to sell Skype back at the start of this year, though details were sketchy. There was no news regarding who the company would be sold to, nor how much it would be sold for, so it's really no surprise that this rumor has surfaced.

Skype unfortunately became a bit troubled earlier in the year, when the company which formed Skype, Joltid, threatened to cancel the licensing for the technology which Skype utilizes. As we stated at the start of last month, when eBay bought Skype for the hefty $2.6 billion price tag, it didn't actually include independent access to the "Global Index" technology, so it stayed under Joltid's control. It may not have seemed like a problem at the time, but it's certainly a thorn in eBay's side now. The software is to be sold to a group of 'private investors', who would apparently run it as a private service first, and then prepare it for, once more, public usage.

So, if Skype was purchased for $2.6B, how much do you expect it'd be worth now? Apparently, eBay is only after $2B, although Skype has been reported to be well on track to bringing in $600M revenue for this year alone. Either way, if this deal is true, expect to hear about it very soon.